


Numbers Don't Lie

by taylor_tut



Category: Voltron: Legendary Defender
Genre: Angst, Emotional Hurt/Comfort, Friendship, Friendship/Love, Gen, Hunk & Lance (Voltron) Friendship, Insecure Lance (Voltron), Lance & Pidge | Katie Holt Friendship, Lance (Voltron) Angst, Lance (Voltron) is a Mess, Lance (Voltron)-centric, Langst, Protective Hunk, Protective Keith (Voltron), Protectiveness, Shiro (Voltron) Has a Clone, Team Bonding, Team as Family, keith lance friendship, mean clone shiro, protective pidge
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-03-06
Updated: 2018-03-06
Packaged: 2019-03-28 00:05:51
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,442
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/13891998
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/taylor_tut/pseuds/taylor_tut
Summary: When clone Shiro makes Lance feel useless, the other paladins are there to show him he's valuable. Based on art by my-boy-lance on tumbrl--the link is in the notes!! Check it out, and their blog! They're awesome!!





	Numbers Don't Lie

**Author's Note:**

> http://my-boy-lance.tumblr.com/post/171602518825/taylor-tut-my-boy-lance-rlly-fast-doodle-but   
> the beautiful, lovely, langsty art that my-boy-lance let me write fic for!!

“Lance, behind you!” Keith called for what seemed like the hundredth time today. Lance turned just in time to turn around and face a bot that had crept up to mere feet in front of him. 

“Gah!” he cried involuntarily, shooting the target in the chest and watching it power down. However, the bot that he’d  _been_  watching from afar was now unchecked-- _thanks, Keith--_ and clocked Lance in the back of the head with its weapon. The blow sent him to the ground, but it didn’t stop him from clambering to his knees to shoot it down before it could strike again.

No one stopped the training sequence. Whether they didn’t see it or didn’t know how bad it was, Lance wasn’t sure, but the bots continued their assault. His head throbbed and he winced against the pain, but he only had a moment to collect himself before Hunk was grabbing under his arms and helping him up from behind, tossing him back into the battle dizzily. 

“Hunk, wait--” he said blearily, his words lost in the sounds of training. 

“Lance,” Shiro barked, “come on! Keep your eyes open!” Lance hadn’t realized that he was squinting so hard against the light, but when he tried to force his eyes open, he found that the pain was unbearable. 

Before Lance could ask for a time out, he heard the tell-tale pings of the system shutting down. A glance down at his chest showed that the target on his armor was glowing.

“What happened?” Pidge asked. She didn’t think that they’d won, but it was so rare for them to lose at this level anymore...

“Ask Lance,” Keith bit. 

Shiro frowned. “You ended the sequence?”

Lance rubbed the back of his head, feeling the lump that had formed there and wincing. “I got hit,” he admitted. However, Shiro only saw the lighting of the targets on his armor and didn’t check him over to find the blood leaking from the wound on the back of his head. It wasn’t a lot, and he knew he wasn’t concussed, but it still hurt, and what hurt even more was that no one seemed to care. 

“And what’s going to happen if you get hit when we’re in a real battle?” he demanded. 

Lance’s mouth dropped open and shut like a fish. “I--I  _have_  been hit in a real battle,” he defended.

  
Pidge nodded furiously. “Yeah, he woke up from a coma to shoot Sendak’s arm off, remember?” she said. 

“ _I_ remember,” Keith muttered bitterly. 

“Well, one lucky hit isn’t a pattern,” Shiro accused, “and your pattern thus far? Let’s pull it up.”

Hunk took a step forward. “Shiro, I think this is a private conversation that we need to--”

But Shiro already had everyone’s stats on the hologram projector in front of them. 

> **ACCURACY MEASURE (AM)**
> 
> **1\. SHIROGANE, TAKASHI: 94%**
> 
> **2\. KOGANE, KEITH: 92%**

Lance glanced at Keith, but he wasn’t smiling triumphantly. Instead, he looked pretty mortified by the whole experience. 

“Stop this,” Pidge interjected, but Shiro was on a war path. 

> **3\. GARRETT, HUNK: 83%**

No one spoke this time. 

> **4\. HOLT, KATIE (GUNDERSON, PIDGE): 82%**

Lance wanted to look away. He hadn’t been this embarrassed since his abuelita spanked him on Easter for cutting in line for food when he was seven. Thus far, nothing had topped the complete, pink-in-the-center humiliation that he’d felt in that moment, crying, bent over his abuela’s knee with his pants down in front of their entire extended and immediate family.

This was arguably worse. He felt like the was going to throw up.

“And finally,” Shiro said dramatically, harshly, “we have you.”

> **5\. MCCLAIN, LANCE: 62%**

Hunk threw a protective arm over his clearly-devastated friend.

“That’s not fair. We all know that Lance’s bayard is long-range,” he defended, and Shiro had the audacity to huff out a laugh. 

“Oh, is it?” They’d been practicing mostly hand-to-hand combat in their sparring most recently, and the business of their bayards had been overall nonessential. 

“Lance,” Shiro drawled, “why don’t you show us your ‘long-range’ weapon.”

Ashamedly, Lance walked slowly to the side of the room and picked up the red bayard, then activated it--trying hard not to wince against the collective gasp of the others when they laid eyes on the sword. 

No one spoke at all, so Shiro sighed. “Take five, everyone,” he commanded. “We’ll reconvene in a few.” 

Not meeting anyone’s eyes, Lance quickly deactivated his bayard-sword and set it hastily back in its place, hurriedly shuffling to the commonroom and hoping that the others would take the hint not to follow him. His head still hurt, but not a worrisome amount, and he reached up to massage his temples. His eyes had just shut when the door slid open. 

“You didn’t tell me you could do  _that_  with your bayard,” Keith said quietly, awe-struck. 

“I’m not very good with it,” Lance admitted.

“Yet,” Hunk added. How many people were lurking in the doorway, anyway? “None of us started out good with our bayards,” he placated.

“So?” Lance snapped. “That was in the beginning, and this is now. We’re up to our necks in enemies and I suck at using my weapon. I’m bringing the team down.” 

Pidge rolled her eyes. “About that,” she said. In her hands was a small projector, which she turned on and waited as the friendly little hologram bot waved hello. “I did a little digging... and I found some numbers I’d like to run by Shiro.”

The hologram beeped as Pidge pressed buttons, then hopped into the air and flattened to make a screen with a display of data. 

> **MCCLAIN, LANCE AM**

  * **MOVEMENT ONE: 13%**



Lance winced, but Pidge shook her head. “That was the first week. It’s about on par with all of us, except Shiro, obviously. Even Keith was only feelin’ 22%.”

Keith nodded, no hint of defensiveness, no hint of competition. 

“Let’s skip ahead a bit,” Hunk instructed. 

**MCCLAIN, LANCE AM**

  * **MOVEMENT 4: 38%**
  * **MOVEMENT 5: 41%**
  * **MOVEMENT 6: 44%**
  * **MOVEMENT 7: 49%**



“As you can see, you improved at a steady but rapid rate--your improvement curve overall is more consistent than anyone else’s.”

Lance looked puzzled, removing his hands from his temples. “What does that mean?”

Keith smiled. “It means that the rest of us got pretty good with our weapons fast, then it evened out. But you never stopped working at it, and you’ve been getting better every single day since we got on the ship.”

“Until just a little while ago, you were performing at... Hunk, drumroll please,” Pidge instructed, and he played the table while she paused for effect, “a whopping 94%.”

Lance’s eyes widened. “I was... I was as good as Shiro?”

“Cut out that ‘was’ crap,” she smirked, pushing up her glasses. “You’re every bit as good as Shiro, still. There’s one other data curve I’d like to show you,” she said, typing away and turning the screen once more toward Lance.

**MCCLAIN, LANCE AM**

  * **MOVEMENT 53: 94%**
  * **MOVEMENT 54: 28%**



“That’s right when you switched to the red bayard, right?” Keith asked. 

Lance nodded. 

“You started out way better with it than your first, probably because you were already trained to fight,” Hunk explained.

“But look here,” Pidge said softly.

**MCCLAIN, LANCE AM**

  * **MOVEMENT 55: 37%**
  * **MOVEMENT 56: 45%**
  * **MOVEMENT 57: 52%**
  * **MOVEMENT 58: 62%**



Lance stared at the numbers blankly. 

“You improved with the red bayard at an unbelievable rate,” she said. “And by extrapolating the data into the average predicted curve... you’ll be back to your spot at 94% by...” she studied the numbers and smiled softly at him. “Within the next 4 movements.” 

Hunk took a seat next to Lance on the floor. “I don’t know what’s going on with Shiro,” he said, “but trust me when we say it’s got nothing to do with you. And if you don’t trust us...” 

Pidge held up a new set of graphs for Lance to study. 

“If you don’t believe us, just look at the numbers.

**HARDWORKING PERCENTAGE:**

**MCCLAIN, LANCE: 110%**

Lance felt a watery smile spread across his face. 

**DEDICATION PERCENTAGE:**

**MCCLAIN, LANCE: 110%**

Lance wanted to reach out and hug them, but the slide-show wasn’t done.

**GOOD FRIEND PERCENTAGE:**

**MCCLAIN, LANCE: 200%**

Lance swiped at his eyes, grinning. “Thanks, guys,” he said, “especially you, Pidgeon.” He pulled her into a tight hug, and she shrugged. 

“Hey, all I did was crunch the numbers,” she insisted. Hunk had thrown an arm around Lance’s neck and even Keith had joined in the group hug. 

Lance knew it would all be okay. Numbers didn’t lie, after all.


End file.
